Chance
When Matt and Chance finally arrived back at the post office, they got right to work combing through all the documents and evidence they had already collected. Many of the documents were banking and real estate as well as CIA-collected evidence on Al-Balshera’s organization. Chance worked the real estate holdings while Matt shuffled through the banking stuff. It wasn’t long before Chance rose from his piles of papers with an idea.
“Matt, do me a favor and help me check Senator Warren’s property holdings.”
“Why Warren?” Matty asked, somewhat puzzled.
“Just a hunch, really. Check them and let me know what you find out. Specifically look for warehouses,” Chance explained as he started.
“Oh, I gotcha, I think I know where you’re going with this.”
As the pair shuffled through their piles, sometimes pausing to fill their coffee cups or use the latrine, the time dragged. And with time clicking away for Samantha, they had to find something quickly.
Chance stood up from his desk and screamed, “I think I got something!”
The pair stopped what they were doing, then Matt grabbed some geographical maps and began to plot them. As they continued to dig through the mountains of documents, they started finding more and more warehouse property listings in the DC area, most near the water front and one listing in Fayetteville—an old blue jeans factory. Each location was pinned on the map so they could have clear view of where each property was and what they were currently being used for.
“You see most of these are concentrated all in one area, Matty.”
“Yeah, I see that, but what I am not seeing in the records is what they are being used for.”
Chance paused and started thumbing through a few months of banking documents.
“I am not finding anything in these that reference rental to anyone or merchandise purchases for himself to store his own purchases inside.” Chance thumbed through a few more. “I think we need to bring the fine Senator in and find out what he does in these warehouses.”
“I agree. Chance, call your guy at the agency and see if they can get the Department of Justice to issue search warrants, and get a warrant out for the Senator, but tell ‘em to keep it on the down low. We don’t need the media getting ahold of this.”
“I would bet a million bucks that those bastard Al-Balshera brothers are right here in Fayetteville, but we need to get Senator Warren in here. I’ll call a friend of mine at the Agency that can push the warrants through. I’ll tell ‘em to concentrate on getting the Fayetteville warrants first.” Chance grabbed his cell and dialed while Matt pulled out their equipment. He needed to inventory what breaching equipment they had and request what else they would need to rescue Samantha once they figured out where the brothers had her.
When Chance hung up the phone, he said, “You are not gonna believe this. Guess who happens to be in town campaigning?”
“Wild guess—Senator Warren,” Matty replied.
“Yep!”
“Do we know where he is at right now?” Matty asked.
“Sure do! He is speaking at the Marriott. Some big campaign fundraiser. So we are going to have to wait to pick him up afterward and do it on the down low.”
***
Matt
Matt’s face started to burn with rage as he thought about having to keep everything on quiet to avoid media attention, but he knew it was best. “Don’t know why we gotta protect that crooked son-of-a-bitch’s reputation when we know he is all part of this shit storm.”
Chance’s reply was quick to point out, “Well, brother, we gotta do what we gotta do to keep Sammie safe, and once we have her back, then you can bury the motherfucker.”
“Deal!” Matt replied, glancing down at his watch. “Chief should be landing soon. I am guessing he will probably have the base shuttle bring him on post since he didn’t ask for a ride.”
“Where’s his truck?” Chance asked then quickly stepping his question back once he saw Matt’s face of non-reply. “That was Chief’s truck in the parking lot. Fuck, I am losing my fucking mind lately. Damn.”
“Just keep packing!” Matt replied. “Once Chief gets here, he is gonna want to interrogate Senator Warren, so we need to get going.”
***
Raleigh
Raleigh’s leg did a continuous thumping the entire flight, and the poor passenger next to him, an elderly woman in her seventies, attempted to calm Raleigh down, but she didn’t have much luck. She kept him busy chatting here and there, and he would forget for a moment then the shaking would start in again.
“Young man, is everything okay?” she asked.
“Ma’am, I’m sorry, am I disturbing you? I don’t mean to. When I am nervous or worried, I get a tad jumpy.”
The old woman smiled and put her hand on Raleigh’s shoulder. “Oh, sweetheart, I promise the plane won’t crash.”
“Oh, ma’am, it isn’t that. It’s something, well, I can’t talk about it, but it’s a really bad thing.” Raleigh attempted to explain himself, but he was failing miserably.
“Nothing is that bad, son, that can’t be undone or fixed. I am sure once you explain to your girl what you did, she’ll forgive you.” Raleigh smiled at the woman then resigned himself to the fact he couldn’t tell her the real reason he was as nervous as a jack rabbit on crack. Instead, he smiled and agreed with her and attempted to keep his leg in check.
It wasn’t long before he felt the rattle of the plane as it slowly descended into the Fayetteville airport. Attempting to make sure he was one of the first off the plane, he grabbed his bag and stuffed it under the seat in front of him. At least I have an aisle seat and near the front. I can grab and run to catch the first shuttle to post. His mind kept wandering as the plane came closer to the ground. I hope she is okay. I don’t know what I would do if I lost her. Just hold on, Sammie. I will be there as quickly as I can. These words kept repeating in his mind: I can’t lose you! I just found you!
When the plane finally touched down, Raleigh already had his bag in his lap and his seat belt unbuckled. It was go time, and he had no time to lose. As the flight attendants opened the door to allow the passengers off, Raleigh was already waiting. The flight attendant at the door wasn’t pleased that Raleigh assisted her in opening the door, but he flashed his signature smile at her, and she melted like sweet cream butter on a hot dinner roll. He laughed to himself at the reactions of some women to his smile, but it worked every time.
Once the door was open and Raleigh got the chance to pull his cell phone out of his pocket and turn it on, he was already at the shuttle waiting area.
One text. Two texts.
Raleigh clicked on the messages icon, and an unknown number appeared. He clicked on the first message, and a photo appeared. It was Samantha, tied and gagged and a bomb strapped around her torso.
Unknown: We want a flight out of the country and the release of all our bank accounts. If these two things happen then we will release the woman once we get to Afghanistan.
Unknown: If we do not get what we want we will blow up two national monuments in Washington, DC, every three hours until we do. We will contact you in two hours.
Raleigh wanted to reply with a threat of his own, but he held off and instead forwarded the messages to Matt and Chance as well as General Andrews to appraise them of the heightened situation and his status.
Raleigh: I am on the ground.
***
Matt
It was enough, though, when the three men received their texts; they knew it was getting close to go time. Matt and Chance had already made it to the hotel and back with the Senator, who had made it a point to demand his lawyer. It took all Matt had not to bust the Senator in the jaw, but they couldn’t show their hand yet. They had to find out everything they could from him and attempt to make a deal if they had to.
Matt and Chance had no idea how long it would take Raleigh to get there, but they knew there was gonna be hell to pay once he did. So the two did all they could to prepare as much as possible. They stuffed the Senator in a room at the post office to await his lawyer while they grabbed what they could so they could brief Raleigh once he arrived.
Grabbing some of the paperwork he had sitting on his desk, Matt asked Chance, “Did you grab the maps and property listing? We’ll set up in the common area, so we can brief Chief once he gets here.”
“Yeah, I got it all. Do you have the banking stuff?” Chance replied.
“Right here. Let’s get set up, and by then, that crooked ass lawyer of the Senator’s should be here.”
“Roger that.”
As the men prepared, it wasn’t long until Raleigh burst into the building, yelling profanity and screaming for the two men.
“You get that piece of shit Senator yet?” Raleigh screamed as he flung open the common area door to find Matt and Chance shuffling papers on the long conference table. “Where is that son of a bitch? I know he knows where Sammie is, and I wanna beat it outta him.”
“Whoa there, cowboy. We gotta wait on his attorney.” Chance knew he just took his life into his own hands, standing in front of Raleigh, his arm outstretched holding the six-foot two-inch Irishman with all the muscle strength he had.
“I don’t gotta wait on shit. I wanna know where ya stuffed that piece of shit so I can find out where his buddies are holding Sammie. They got her strapped to a bomb in some building, and I wanna know where and I wanna know now. Not when his attorney gets here and tells him not to talk. Now, when I can beat the shit outta him until he talks.” Raleigh pushed his way past Chance, only to be stopped by Matt.
“Chief, you know you can’t beat him.” Matt tried to reason with him, but there was nothing that was going to stop Raleigh Fitzgerald. He was determined to get to the Senator, so instead of stopping him Matt quickly thought of an alternative. “Okay, Chief, Chance and I will take you to the Senator, but you have to promise not to lay a hand on him and let us do the talking. You just stand there in the corner looking like you do right now. If you do that, I bet he talks.”
At first, Matt was not sure he had gotten through to him; the anger on Raleigh’s face was more than telling and a visible sign that if the Senator so much as spoke outta line, Raleigh would gut him like a fish.
“Wait here, Chief! Chance and I will go get Warren. All right?”
“Fine but make it quick. I don’t know how much time Sammie has.”
“We will, but wait here! And I mean it, Chief. WAIT. That is an order.”
***
Raleigh
Raleigh paced back and forth in the large room, waiting and trying to keep his cool as the image of Samantha played over in his head. It killed him to think that those bastards had put their hands on her, and it wasn’t the first time. The guilt played over in Raleigh’s brain—if they had only had the chance to get to Saheed and Jahan when his unit rescued Samantha all those years ago, the Al-Balshera brothers wouldn’t have her now. Thoughts played around in his head. Does Samantha know these are the same men who killed her partner, stripped her bare, and beat her? I can only pray she doesn’t.
That mission had brought them together initially so many years ago, and once again Samantha was in mortal danger from the same men who had emotionally scarred her for life. The more he thought about Samantha tied to that chair, a bomb strapped to her chest, the angrier he got, and he punched his fist through the wall. It wasn’t until he heard the sound of his phone pinging that he stopped, grabbed his phone from his jacket pocket, and opened the message app. It was another video, and Raleigh’s heart stopped as he viewed it.
Samantha’s uniform jacket and shirt were torn open now, exposing her breasts. The bomb still strapped to her torso had been moved down, and Samantha was screaming profanities and kicking at the men. The younger man, Jahan, began to accost her while the older brother Saheed attempted to speak, but the more he tried, the louder Samantha became until Saheed turned and using the buttstock of his weapon, busted her in the head, knocking her out.
“You have two hours starting now.” Then the video ended.
Raleigh screamed and punched the wall again. “Fuck! Matt, what the fuck is taking so long?”
At this same moment, Matt and Chance were just making their way into the common area with the Senator. Raleigh instantly reared, grabbed his sidearm, then grabbed the Senator, shoving him into a chair and hand-cuffing him to the seat back. Raleigh pushed his 9mm handgun into the Senator’s temple. “I am gonna give you one chance to tell me the fucking truth or I am gonna shoot you in the fucking head right now. I wanna know where the fuck they are holding Sergeant O’Hara, and I want to know what the fuck you know about this?”
The Senator hedged back, doing all he could to avoid Raleigh and the weapon he held against his temple, but the more he fought, the harder Raleigh held the weapon.
“I swear I don’t know anything!” Warren pleaded, adjusting himself in the chair.
Raleigh pressed the gun harder as the Senator pleaded. “I swear if I knew, I would tell you! Do you think I wanna die?”
“I know this. If you don’t tell me something now, I will kill you anyway,” Raleigh demanded.
“But if you kill me, you will never find your sergeant.” Warren stared at the men with a half-smile.
“So, you do know where they are holding Samantha?” Matt interjected himself in hope that Raleigh would calm down, but the smile on the Senator’s face only enraged Raleigh, and he pistol whipped him before Matt could stop him.
Warren’s head flew backward as the pistol struck him in the brow, cutting just above the right eye. As the blood ran down his cheek, Raleigh grabbed the Senator by his collar and pulled him closer, looking him straight in the eyes. Raleigh’s face turned somber and softer as he spoke.
“Look, I am asking you, not just for me but for an innocent person—Samantha did nothing to you or to your associates. If you have any idea where she might be, please, I am begging you to please tell us.”
The Senator paused for a few moments and regained his composure as Raleigh stood waiting. Chance walked back into the room with two cups of coffee. “I have a couple of ideas, but you have to promise that you get me immunity and get me out of the state somewhere safe that they can’t find me. If they do, they will kill me and my family. This is way bigger than just some small-time terrorist cell. This goes deep inside our government. Deeper than you can ever imagine.”
Chance walked up to Warren and pulled up a chair next to him. “So why don’t you tell us?”
Frustrated, Raleigh stopped Chance. “We don’t have time for this.” Raleigh begged, “I promise and so do these two. Now please tell us.”
“I gotta hear them say it. Then I will tell you!” Warren repeated.
“Fine. I promise!” Matt sounded off then Chance, “I promise. Now please tell us.”
Warren straightened in his chair and nudged his head toward the handcuffs. “Will you loosen these, please?”
Raleigh obliged then sat down in front of the Senator. “Spill it!” He paused. “Please.”
Chance and Matt stood waiting just behind Raleigh, in case the Senator said something that Raleigh didn’t like, to hold him if he tried to strangle the Senator.
“There is only one place they could be holding your sergeant, and that would be the old jeans factory on the edge of town. It is one of my holdings that the ARC had me purchase.”
Raleigh looked back at Matt and Chance, all three men confused. “ARC? What’s the ARC?”
Warren smiled. “You don’t know what the ARC is?”
Raleigh replied, “No, should we?”
“If you don’t know, you will. But right now, it is way too complicated and will take too much time to explain. Right now, you need to get to that factory before they kill her, and they will kill her. And you need to get me somewhere safe—me and my family—and you gotta do it on the down low, because if anyone sees you around my place, they will kill my family and hunt me to the ends of the earth.”
“Don’t worry, Senator, we will take care of it.” Raleigh stood up and motioned for the other two men to follow him.
“Matty, call the general, apprise him of what’s going on, and tell him we are gonna need the squad for a mission. Can you do that?” Raleigh asked.
“Yeah, no problem. But I am going with you,” Matt explained.
“No problem. We are gonna need all the fire power we can get to get her out alive. We don’t have much time. Saheed sent a video and said we have,” Raleigh checked his watch, “less than two hours now to meet his demands. So that leaves us less than an hour to get the guys suited up and briefed to hit the factory.”
“All right, no problem,” Matt responded, grabbing his cell and taking off out into the hallway.
Raleigh then turned to Chance. “No one knows you around here, so you should be able to go in with the Senator and retrieve his family and get them to a safe place. Can you do that?”
Chance replied with, “I got you, brother!” then headed over to the Senator.
“Let me know when you are safe.” Raleigh gave him a nod then grabbed his cell to call in his squad.